Life's Four Seasons

Life’s Four Seasons

 

     I just celebrated my sixty-second birthday and I must admit that I am a product of the 60’s and 70’s; I grew up on music from the time I was a wee youngster. My first recollection of music was when I would stand under the tree in the back yard, with a play guitar and sing, “You ain’t nothin but a hound dog,” by the King of Rock and Roll, Elvis Presley. I was maybe four years old at the time and for a kid, I thought I was pretty good. Once my Dad took me to Dixie Cleaners on Pio Nono Avenue in Macon to pick up the cleaning, I was wearing my cowboy suit, all little boys in the late 50’s had a cowboy suit. He politely told the gentleman at the cleaners that I could sing like Elvis, so the man offered me a quarter to perform. I vividly remember that day because I was too shy to share my talent even for money and a quarter was worth a lot more than it is today. My Mother loved Hank Williams and Patty Page, I can remember as a youngster her singing Patti Page’s hit song, The Tennessee Waltz as I sat by her bed once when she was sick. Yes, music has been an important factor in this man’s life. 

    At the age of thirteen years, my family moved about twelve miles north of Macon. I started my first year of high school in a new school meeting new people. Down the street was a boy about a year older than me, named Tommy Deane. Tommy played guitar and sang in a band called the Belvederes. He and I quickly became best friends and he began teaching me to play the guitar. I had no musical instruments, so I borrowed his to learn on.  I remember ordering a Kay guitar through a magazine for $20.00. It was a box guitar and really inexpensive as musical instruments go today, but to me it was priceless. I learned to play on that sweet little guitar that I still have it to this day. Mom seeing that I was really interested in this new form of entertainment told me that if I learned five songs, she would get me an electric guitar and amplifier. I learned those five songs and for Christmas I received as a gift a gold Kent, two pick up guitar and a small amplifier. Look out Beatles and Dave Clark Five; I thought I was now a real rock star. Tommy and I would set up in the basement of our house and play and sing for hours. Within a year or so, I heard a rumor that a group of guys had a band called The Good Guys and they needed a rhythm guitarist, so I asked for an audition. I got the position and was off to make my mark in the music industry. In 1968, my Mom went to a music store in Macon and for my birthday purchased a 1968 Gibson Cherry Wood SG for $268.00, an expensive guitar for the time. I was elated at the prize, through the years musicians like Santana, Frank Zappa, Eric Clapton and Jerry Garcia have owned and played SG’s. Today that guitar is valued around $6,000.00 and still in my possession. I gave up my music in 1969 to begin working for a regular part-time paycheck and really never looked back until recent years. Life seems to pass rather quickly and then at some point it stops and reminds you of the what-ifs in life. What-if I had gone on that trip to Europe, what-if I had stayed into the music scene, what-if I could do my life over. The what-ifs can be frightening!

  I think we can all look at life in four categories: Spring, summer, fall, and winter. This is nothing new, so I am not going to create a revelation, but I am going to poise the categories in a different way.

  Let’s look at spring, the time from our birth to our teenage years, the time when we are the happiest, no worries or cares. Let us go outside, run, jump and just get dirty. This is a time when the little things are important, birthday parties or a cheap toy to play with, when a relative comes to visit. You look up to your older siblings and life is just good. When I think about those innocent years of spring I think about the song Sammy Davis Jr. sang entitled The Candy Man. He talks about taking tomorrow, dipping it in a dream, separating the sorrow, collecting up the cream. He mixes it with love and makes the world taste good. That’s what spring is like, a candy factory where everything is good, everything is sweet and the sunshine sprinkles everything with dew.

  Summer of our life is when things begin to change. Our thoughts are no longer innocent as in years past. We begin to think we have all the answers and our parents know nothing. Our mind is outgrowing our bodies and we begin to notice the other sex. We are restless and have to make our mark in the world to keep up with our peers. Summer is a rough time not only for the teen, but for the parents as well. They know they need to give you some rope to run on, but feel they need to reel you in as well.  The summer of our lives reminds me of the Bob Segar song, Night Moves, trying to lose those awkward teenage blues; strange how the night moves with autumn closing in. Summer can bring on heated and hot temperatures, but as autumn makes its way in our lives, the air begins to cool.

  Autumn is a beautiful time; the trees begin to change colors to the earthy, orange, gold and yellow. The thought of brisk nights and walks in the autumn air, the smell of leaves burning in the yards, give a feeling of comfort. My favorite thing to do is sit on the porch with a cup of Joe and enjoy the nice evenings and relax. After summer; our life takes on a huge change, we begin to get settled in anticipating the upcoming season of winter. We know we need to be assured that everything is ready for the cold that is to come, the bleak and dreary gray months. We have played in the early season, made our mark in the world in the summer season, now we need to begin preparing for the latter season. We are quite comfortable in the autumn, we have frolicked and enjoyed life rather haphazardly and now we have to use the autumn to settle in. Enjoy the moments of our season and our loved ones, relish in the pride of raising our children to be great parents and loving the offspring they produce. Gordon Lightfoot wrote a song; Carefree Highway that fits the autumn perfectly, the thing that I call living is just being satisfied, knowing I got no one left to blame. Autumn is a time to enjoy your past accomplishments.

  Now I come to the season that I am currently living in, winter, and a time when you are able to reflect on the past, enjoy the present, and wonder what the future holds. A time when you wonder if you could get a redo, what would you change? My wife tells me I dwell too much on the past, but in essence the past is all we have as we face the bleakness of the winter. Our children are busy raising their families and working on their careers, because they are in the summer and approaching the autumn in their lives. As winter approaches, Dust in the Wind, by Kansas comes to mind. I close my eyes, only for a moment and the moments gone. All my dreams pass before my eyes, a curiosity.                 Different song from the past holds memories of good and bad times, of people and places that represent my life. If I had a redo, would I change my life? No, my life was meant to be the way it is, a drop of water in an endless sea. Memories are fun, but they can only be recalled for a moment, enjoy them.

 

“Life Happens”